To state one important point up front, I’m not necessarily the target mark for a law procedural. I don’t have anything against them, but the cadence of your requisite law show often feels repetitive to me – as a procedural is by design – meaning I may check out an episode and then call “case closed” on watching any more of the series. I state this not to turn the focus of the review on me, but to contextualize that I meant to watch the pilot of CBS’s new law procedural Cupertino out of due diligence, and ended up avidly watching all 10 episodes provided to critics in a row, nearly without breaks.
That shouldn’t be too much of a surprise… Cupertino comes from TV veterans Robert and Michelle King, creators of The Good Wife, The Good Fight, Elsbeth, and the superb Evil, and you can see elements of all of those shows picked up and thrown into the new series. For example: you’ve got Mike Colter from Evil as one of the co-leads, alongside newcomer (to the Kingaverse) Rachel Keller as a religious woman struggling with her faith in Silicon Valley. You’ve got quirky judges, musical sing-a-longs, and extremely sharp observations about the state of the world (in this case, the rise of A.I.) alongside bubbling romances and character moments, both funny and heartfelt.
The Kings know what they’re doing at this point, crafting yet another entertainment delivery machine that is fast, funny, engrossing, and more importantly has something to say.
The plot follows Michael Price (Colter), a lawyer and co-founder of a Silicon Valley startup who gets suddenly fired and finds himself out on the street, next to a similarly fired junior lawyer named Olivia Siffre*. They’re both let go for different reasons, which leads Price to come up with a sort of Strangers on a Train approach to their cases: what if they sue the company on behalf of each other? Alongside a loyal assistant with an extended family and contacts at TGI Fridays who also gets fired named Christy Palladino (Ella Stiller, who yes, is the daughter of Ben Stiller and Christine Taylor), the three form a law firm dedicated to taking on the Magnificent Seven, aka the monolithic tech firms that dominate Silicon Valley, and really, run the world.
(*“Price” for the guy who is trying to figure out what the price for his soul is, and “cypher” for a character who isn’t sure who she is? This show is not subtle.)
The twist? They know they can’t beat them. The companies are too big, have too much money, too much control. Instead, if the new firm of Price and Siffre takes on cases for the little guys who can’t defend themselves, they can settle. The firm gets money, the defendants get some justice, and they’re not stuck in court for years as Meta, Google, etc suck them dry and leave them destitute. The show isn’t Erin Brockovich where they’re pulling the whole system down… They’re trying to make enough money to get paid, keep the firm going, and build some sort of office in the massive space they accidentally fall into… A running joke throughout the series is how they have a lobby, and the rest of the office is all smoke and mirrors, filled with actors and fake walls to make opposing attorneys think they’re bigger than they are.
Though Michael and Olivia purport to be there to help a little and make money a lot, the show isn’t just here to have a good time… The Kings dive into multiple debates around the rise of Generative AI, and that’s the part that plays out like a horror show. It’s a remarkably nuanced approach in most episodes, which tackles everything from using AI for song generation to organ donation. There are nods to the rise of AGI (aka self-aware AI) and the potential for the end of the world, but the real fear is how tech companies have injected chatbots into every aspect of our lives, ceding human oversight without guard rails or thought about what it means for, you know, humans. Cupertino often treats this all lightly enough, but when it gets serious, it gets very serious about the cost of what billionaires are doing. I likely don’t need to point out the irony of a smart show about how dangerous billionaires are airing on CBS is, but I’ll do it anyway: it’s extremely difficult to Trojan Horse these sorts of messages in popular entertainment; particularly on a channel known for leaning conservative, with a news division that is currently the subject of a huge amount of scrutiny for loosening of ethics itself. The Kings do this smartly and sharply, letting the harsh warnings in the script sneak in under all the fun and hot lawyers doing hot lawyer things.
As for those hot lawyers, the show plays to Colter’s strengths as an earnest, straightforward guy; though we get to see him play a lot of different layers as he tangles with the always excellent Joe Morton as his celebrity lawyer father whose ethics are much looser than Michael’s. Keller, so great on FX’s Legion, mostly gets to play the good religious girl who is discovering a bigger world, but is so engaging to watch on screen it hardly matters. Stiller, meanwhile, steals every scene she’s in as the gregarious Christy, a big personality with a bigger family who can make anything happen at any time. Watching her on screen is a joyful experience, and nepo baby accusations aside, you can see a star being born.
Beyond that central trio, it’s clear that the Kings are fans of the late, great Girls5Eva, as half the cast are also regulars on this show. Busy Phillips is fantastic as always as the ex-wife of one of those evil billionaires (played by King regular Fisher Stevens) who also has a law background, and more importantly the money to keep the firm going. As usual, if you want to punctuate a scene with a surprising expression, cut to Phillips for a reaction shot and you’ll get a laugh; the same holds true here. And Renee Elise Goldsberry is a rival lawyer with a history with Michael who ends up in Silicon Valley, usually on the opposite side of the aisle. She brings a sparkling chemistry with Colter, and an easy familiarity in her scenes with Phillips. Fingers crossed they can figure out a way to bring Paula Pell and Sara Bareilles on for a full Girls5Eva reunion.
Other cast include Nik Dodani as a client turned tech advisor to the firm who is a little underutilized in the initial 10 episodes (at least 10 more episodes have been ordered for the first season), but still a fun addition. And Rob McClure, a Broadway veteran, brings a huge dose of intrigue to the show as a mysterious, recurring client named Bo who gives the series a season-long serialized element, alongside the case-of-the-week format.
The cases, too, are creatively staged… While most take place in a small courtroom (it is a lawyer show, after all), there are big trips outside, from one that finds a polymarket firm under attack with Olive and Michael pitted against each other, rushing through jail and around town; to a stand-out episode where everyone gets trapped in traffic and has mere hours to try an organ donation case before the organ is no longer viable.
Look, there’s been a lot of discussion online lamenting how the rise of streaming has killed off the old broadcast television model. That’s not completely true, as you can look at a number of shows that are long-running; serialized, and procedural. But none of them are doing it as well as Cupertino. And none of them have as much to say, or are saying it as well as the Kings. If you miss the glory days of TV when television was Television and you had to tune in every week to find out what was next for characters you loved played by actors you adored? Cupertino is that show. Do not miss this, and make sure to watch it in droves, before CBS’s AI realizes what’s going on and cancels the series.
Cupertino premieres Thursday, Oct. 8 at 10:01 pm ET on CBS, and streams the next day on Paramount+.
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